l'Artisan Électronique

While industry and craftsmanship are positioned as polar opposites, they would be more accurately represented as volatile points in a matrix of manual, mechanical, and electrical forces. Wheel-thrown pottery, for example, though now considered an artisanal skill, developed as a partial automation of coil pottery by the third millennium, B.C., making the production of small clay vessels more efficient. If industry is characterized by the displacement of advanced operations from hands to machines, then handicraft is defined by its retention of fine motor skills mastered over years of practice. In l’Artisan Électronique, designers Unfold and Tim Knapen investigate the intersection between craft, industry, and digital making, avoiding easy categorisation.

While industry and craftsmanship are positioned as polar opposites, they would be more accurately represented as volatile points in a matrix of manual, mechanical, and electrical forces. Wheel-thrown pottery, for example, though now considered an artisanal skill, developed as a partial automation of coil pottery by the third millennium, B.C., making the production of small clay vessels more efficient. If industry is characterized by the displacement of advanced operations from hands to machines, then handicraft is defined by its retention of fine motor skills mastered over years of practice. In l’Artisan Électronique, designers Unfold and Tim Knapen investigate the intersection between craft, industry, and digital making, avoiding easy categorisation.

The project is set up as a miniature production center, featuring a digital potter’s wheel connected to a 3D ceramic printer. As a virtual cylinder spins on a computer screen, the user cuts away and elaborates its shape by passing his or her hand through a laser. When satisfied with the final form, the user can submit the customised model to a digital archive, which then supplies the 3D printer with geometric instructions. Finally, the printer traces the desired shape, layer by layer, in a process akin to coiling. By interweaving a variety of skill-sets, l’Artisan Électronique removes making from the exclusive realm of the machine or the craftsman, and introduces the amateur as an active contributor.

text by Tamar Shafrir for Printing Things
An elaborate essay on l’Artisan Électronique by Unfold co-founder Claire Warnier can be downloaded here.

L’Artisan Electronique is an installation in collaboration with Tim Knapen and commissioned for the exhibition Design by Performance by Z33, house for contemporary art. With support from Bits from Bytes and the RepRap community.

L'Artisan Electronique has been featured in, amongst others: Design by Performance at Z33, Hasselt (BE); Abu Dhabi Art, Abu Dhabi (AE); Curious Minds at the Israel Museum, Jeruzalem (IL); Industrious Artefacts at Zuiderzeemuseum, Enkhuizen (NL); Out of Hand at the Museum of Arts and Design, New York (US); Atoms + Bytes at Bellevue Arts Museum (US); Out of Hand at the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, Sydney (AU); Impression 3D at Le Lieu du Design, Paris (FR); Demain c'est aujourd'hui at Biennale Internationale Design, Saint-Étienne (FR); Utrecht Manifest, Biennial for Social Design, Utrecht (NL); Taiwan Ceramics Biennale, Taipei (TW), Data Clay at Museum for Craft and Design, San Francisco (US), Cheongju International Craft Biennale (KR).

fig. 01, 03, 08: photography by Kristof Vrancken
fig. 02: photography by Peter Verbruggen
fig. 06, 07: photography by Liesje Reyskens
fig. 16: photography by Tim Knapen